Institute for Process Engineering

Chair of thermal process engineering

Mixture simulations are performed using the Discrete Element Method (DEM) with the freely available LIGGGHTS software. However, the DEM is 
not applicable to particulate systems of technically relevant size for reasons of computing time, especially for non-spherical particles. 
Therefore, the DEM simulations are performed for small particle systems and simple mixer geometry (rotating drum with or without 
internals, stationary or rotating drum with rotating mixing arm).

Cross-correlations are then developed from the comparison of simulated and measured mixing grades, which ultimately make it possible to 
derive the behavior of a technical mixer from the behavior of a small simulator (virtual mixer) and which can be calculated quickly and efficiently using DEM.